The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1887-05-07
Correspondence Baltimore County Union.
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
THE WORLDS RAIN.


Could we but utilize all the water-power lifted
from the ocean by the sunbeams and waited by
the zephyrs over the land what vast factories
might we run what magni6ed Niagaras might |
we create In recent paper to the Royal Society
of Edinburgh, Mr.. John Murray sought to give
the worlds rainfall in figures. The areas Of
country having an inland drainage-equal to H.
4S9,350 square miles-receive :, 243 cubic miles CT
rain yearly. The total areas draining directly to
the ocean equal A, All 900 square miles, of which
S,S2675O square miles have more than ten inches
of annual rainfall, and discharge into the sea
$500 cubic miles Of water each year. By this
means rather more 5000, 900 tons of solids
are carried to the ocean annually.
CoPPERAS ON THE FARM.
In British experiments last year, copperas
proved valuable fertilizer for many crops. An
increase of 400 pounds in the potato yield of an
eighth of an acre resulted from treatment with
fourteen pounds of copperas. 1t gave crop of
turnips as did guano and dissolved bones, and
nearly doubled the yield of field of hay. Good
results were also obtained with onions, beans and
mangold-wurzel.
DYNAMITE SUBSTITUTE.
new explosive, to which the name of "Belite'
has been given, is regarded by certain scientific
men of Europe as likely to come into general use
in place of dynamite and other nitro lycerine
compounds, and is recommended as q substitute
for coarse gunpowder in the larger firearms. 1t
is mixture of nitrate of ammonium with a DIM
LrODeuZlQ6. EAptIlulcHto uulluS eho puos WV
years by M. Carl Lamm, of Stockholm, indicate
that the substance is not only the safest but the
most powerful explosive known, with mean
force equal to thirty five times that of ordinary
cannon gunpowder, and o blasting effect greater
than that of any material having nitro glycerine
as base. 1t has the great advantage of being
exploded only by heat, no amount OF shock or
friction having any effect upon it, and it may
therefore be handled without danger of accident,
while it is less adapted for ilegitimate use than
dynamite. Further results will be awaited with
interest.
OUR PLANTS
1t seems strange that out Of more than 10 00O
species of plants known to botanists only about
$50 have been put to use by man yet this pro-
portion is much greater than in the animal world,
from which only some 200 species have been select
ed, while the animal kingdom reckons millions OF
species. De Candolle names 247 useful cultivated
plants of which Al appear to have been cultivated
for more than 1000 years, and 81 for less than
1900 years. The plants of modern adoption
are chiefly artificial folders, and within the last
1900 years men have commenced the cultivation
of not single species which can rival maize, rice
the sweet potato, the potato, the bread-frut, the
date, cereals, millets, sorghums, the banana, or
SOW The ancients enjoye the use of these-3,0OO,
1000 or 5000 years, perhaps even in some cases
5000 years, ago. remarkable fact is that more
than three-fourths of the plants which have been
cultivated for more than 1000 years are still
found wild in identical form.
TERRESTRIAL CONTRACTION.
From experiments by Col. Totten, Lyett has
calculated that mass of sandstone mile thick,
raised in temperature 200 degrees f., would have
its upper surface elevated ten feet; and that
portion of the earths crust fifty miles thick, raised
600 to 800 degrees, might produce an elevation OF
1000 to 1900 feet. Cooling again, would reverse
the result. Such cooling has actually taken place,
and the contraction has given the earth its rreg-
ular surface and gigantic mountain wrinkles
That the process is still going We have frequent
evidence in earthquake phenomena. In chang
ing to solid form the earth's shrinkage must
have been much greater, as the common minerals
lose from three to eleven per cent. in hardening
from melted state.
MISCELLANEOUS.
During 1886 eleven new asteroids were detected,
increasing the number known to 264. OF this
total, fifty-seven have been discovered by DR.. ].
Palisa, of Vienna, and forty by DR.. Peters, of
Clinton, N. Y.
The chief veterinary surgeon of the British
army, DR.. Geo. Fleming, finds sufficient expert
mental evidence to convince him that smallpox
and cow ox are not identical, as is generally be-
Iieved and that the virus of one will not produce
the other.
The susceptibility of manganese steel to mag
netism is found to be very slight, making it es
pecialy desirable for ships on account OF its feeble
influence on the compass. Its tensile strength is
twice that of ordinary steel.
The longest tunnel in the world, commenced in
1882 and finished in 1878, drains the Schemnitz
mines, in Hungary. 1t is 1927 miles in length,
or about a mile longer than St. Gothard, with
height of feet 10 inches, and breadth of feet
inches.
The fourth case of the successful removal of a
tumor from the brain has been reported in Eng
land, the weight of the tumor being four and
half ounces. These of brain surgery, with
the exact location from the symptoms of the spot
affected, are feats of which science may well be
proud.
1t has been discovered in France that the fatty
s-s--ressa I,lay lSe transforI noa Into sub
stance, which has been named "ceroid, having
the consistency and several properties of wax.
According to the Austrian consul at Yokohama,
the earthquakes of Japan destroy city every
seven years on the average.
An assistant to Prof. Virchow, DR.. Grawitz,
finds that about third of the cases pronounced
in life muscular rheumatism shown by post
norton examination to be due to trichinae, or
pork-worms. In instances observed the parasites
must have been present in the muscles for many
years.